Thursday, January 27, 2005

Firefox - A New Religion?

Is Firefox a bad web browser? No. Is it the next coming of the Almighty? According to some it would seem that way. It is one thing recommending a program, it is entirely another to preach about something as if you were part of a religious cult.

"Welcome to Spread Firefox. You are our marketing department, a diverse community of people tired of swatting popups, chasing spyware, combating identity theft and installing security updates you could set your watch to. You have a vision of the 21st century web and are ready to push it to the world, wresting control from a monopoly that has let it stagnate. We'll provide the tools, but you will drive campaigns that will be rolled out here over the coming months."

You can see clearly here this site is less about recommending a better browser and more about a crusade against Microsoft. But to have your crusade you must have a Religion and of course followers. To recruit followers you need beliefs.

Beliefs

Beliefs through propaganda? Yes, Firefox is being marketed as if it is superior to Internet Explorer in regards to Pop-ups, Spyware and Security. How convenient of the Firefox followers to leave out the other side of the story:

The Dark SideInternet Explorer with Service Pack 2 installed for Windows XP is just as secure as Firefox in relation to Spyware and Pop-ups. Service Pack 2, released Aug 2, 2004 (Firefox 1.0 released November 9, 2004), includes the following security enhancements relating to Internet Explorer:

These features eliminate the threat of auto install Spyware. However like anything, Spyware can still infect people via ignoring the warnings or installing applications with bundled Spyware. How many people do you think who are told to use Firefox are told this? How many people are told there is a solution to the Spyware problem using free software in simple guides like these:

15% of web pages aren't completely compatible with FirefoxFirefox is not 100% Internet Explorer and ActiveX compatible. Web pages that depend on ActiveX or were only tested in Internet Explorer will only render and work properly in Internet Explorer based browsers. Web page features such as Menus, Web forms or other content may not function or behave differently then intended. This means that someone using Firefox may come across a website that does not look or work right. This is pretty significant information that is conveniently left out by the legions of Firefox followers.

InnovationsFirefox is being touted as having innovated features as if it invented them, such as tabbed browsing and Pop-up blocking. I'm sorry to be the historian and ruin everyone's party but Opera has had these "Innovations" for years. So have other web browser like Netcaptor, Avant Browser, Maxthon (MyIE2).

Followers

Firefox followers can be anyone but obviously people with too much time on their hands. Let me clear something up, there are many respectable users of Firefox who use it and understand it for what is and do not preach it but recommend it. These are the same respectable people who have always done this with every program they have used. This new trend of the "Followers" does not include them. For to become a Follower you have to submit to the hype and preach the beliefs. At which point you become part of the religion, Spamming "Firefox Rules!" everywhere you go. As an example of how ridiculous it has become, I submit the following from a news article:

"All of this has been a pinch-yourself experience for Mozilla's Baker. A former Netscaper, she became accustomed to laboring in obscurity during the Mozilla project's early days. Now she's struggling with the group's recognition. She gets buttonholed by parents at her son's school and approached by strangers at exercise class.Recently, after Baker handed a Mozilla T-shirt to a friend at Trapeze Arts, the circus-skills gym where she works out, a nearby woman burst out: "Are you from Mozilla? Firefox changed my life!" She then kneeled and bowed before a stunned Baker."

Need I say more?

The Religion

I've never seen anything as crazy as the Firefox Followers who bombard everyone with "Use Firefox, Take Back the Web!" "Firefox Rules!" Slogans, signatures, advertisements ect... Its not just in forums its now in magazines, newspaper ads, bumper stickers, it's everywhere and it's down right annoying. This is like the Jehovah Witness follower who keeps coming to your door even though you're not interested. Honestly I'm a little scared that there is a generation of kids out their who have been brain washed to spending a good portion of their life promoting a web browser as if it was their religion. If I had known this I could have utilized this army of zombies to promote "Use Antivirus Software! So you stop sending me infected E-mails!" Which is probably a more useful allocation of resources anyway but I will leave the Religion founding to the pros over at www.spreadfirefox.com

66 comments:

"Internet ExplorerInternet Explorer 6 is now over 3 years old. Why doesn’t Microsoft fix it? What are they waiting for? Alternatives such as Mozilla and Opera offer great features such as tabbed browsing, pop-up blockers, smart integrated searching, and smart downloading. Is Microsoft planning to deprecate IE? If so, why is IE so entrenched into the core OS? IE is literally a window into Windows! If mal-ware can take IE, it has the OS. In 1997, Microsoft declared Netscape a non-issue with Internet Explorer taking 95% of the browser market share."

So, why are you saying that IE is better...i don't get it. You are a freaking Bill Gates's balls sucker.

"You can see clearly here this site is less about recommending a better browser and more about a crusade against Microsoft."How do you get that from the paragraph you quoted? The quote speaks specifically to giving people a better browser, one without irritating popups, spyware etc.

Windows XP SP2 may solve a lot of these problems, but there's a hell of a lot of people out there on Windows 9x or 2000.

"So, why are you saying that IE is better...i don't get it. You are a freaking Bill Gates's balls sucker."

I'm not that was from another Editor: Douglas, A long time Linux user. Read more carefully.

"How do you get that from the paragraph you quoted? The quote speaks specifically to giving people a better browser, one without irritating popups, spyware etc."

Because this comment says this: "wresting control from a monopoly that has let it stagnate"

"Windows XP SP2 may solve a lot of these problems, but there's a hell of a lot of people out there on Windows 9x or 2000."

Time to upgrade? :) Seriously, there are significant steps they can take to prevent much of this. Windows 9x, 2000 Users can perform Steps 1 through 3 in this guide: http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/OptimizeXP.html

"Er, ok....."The key word is COMPLETELY. If a table or graphic is shifted out of position, it counts. More pages then people realize use ActiveX.

"The fact of the matter is the "addons" that SP2 puts into IE6 does not take care of the poblem. It only slows it down."No it prevents auto-installing Spyware from executing. The largest majority of auto install problems (you just visit a site and it installs) were due to exploits in MSJVM, SP2 uninstalls that thus removing the vulnerability. The ActiveX warning system gives a blatant warning before the ActiveX control is installed. Spyware can always be installed if people click on "Yes" to installation warning but this has nothing to due with it auto-installing. SpywareBlaster hads significant protection from even the ones people click on. The only FUD is that you can not make IE secure. Currently with SP2 IE is as secure from spyware as the end user chooses.

Firefox has been adpoted by some of my friends and they seem to be preaching the gospel. One friend on a Windows Millenium machine says he no longer crashes. I told him Millenium was an unstable piece of junk anyway.For me it means new standards as i design websites. I am not into the cult of ....(MAC,FIREFOX) although i understand why users enjoy using these products so much. Especially if you listen to steve wozniak talking about how he made the early apple computers on www.itconversations.com . So all in all, I think Firefox does make non-expert users feel safer even if they are not. Microsoft needs to win back consumers trust, but will this take the release of Longhorn somewhere in 2006? Who knows.

"You can see clearly here this site is less about recommending a better browser and more about a crusade against Microsoft. But to have your crusade you must have a Religion and of course followers. To recruit followers you need beliefs."

What you lack, is historical perspective. There are perfectly good reasons for those slogans like 'Take back the web!' etc. A more accurate description would be: 'Restore the balance', but these things tend to get overhyped, partly to get the message across.

STATEMENT 1"Internet Explorer with Service Pack 2 installed for Windows XP is just as secure as Firefox in relation to Spyware and Pop-ups. Service Pack 2 includes the following security enhancements relating to Internet Explorer:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/security/security_report_windows_vs_linux/I know this last article talks specifically about Linux, but there are a lot of valid points in here about Windows security.

E.g."When Microsoft integrated Internet Explorer into the operating system, Microsoft created a system where any flaw in Internet Explorer could expose your Windows desktop to risks that go far beyond what you do with your browser. A single flaw in Internet Explorer is therefore exposed in countless other applications, many of which may use Internet Explorer in a way that is not obvious to the user, giving the user a false sense of security.

This architectural model has far deeper implications that most people may find difficult to grasp, one being that a monolithic system tends to make security vulnerabilities more critical than they need to be."

STATEMENT 215% of web pages aren't completely compatible with Firefox:Firefox is not 100% Internet Explorer and ActiveX compatible. Web pages that depend on ActiveX or were only tested in Internet Explorer will only render and work properly in Internet Explorer based browsers. Web page features such as Menus, Web forms or other content may not function or behave differently then intended. This means that someone using Firefox may come across a website that does not look or work right. This is pretty significant information that is conveniently left out by the legions of Firefox followers.

Again I offer you these links:http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20050127222737475http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/malmobcode/chapter/ch11.html

There is a GOOD REASON Firefox does not use ActiveX. ActiveX is a bad idea in most cases. If webpages depend on ActiveX or were only tested in Internet Explorer, then the website developer(s) did a pretty bad job at it anyway. Not only do they deny themselves the benefits that come with the use of Open Standards (www.w3c.org), but they also loose X% of their target audience. Can you really afford to loose over 10% of your potential audience?

STATEMENT 3The Security Myth:"Firefox is 100% Secure", simply not true. While it is hard to call Internet Explorer secure with all the security patches, you cannot say Firefox is completely secure either. Firefox currently has five security vulnerabilities in its v1.x browser, Secunia vulnerability Report - Firefox. Keep in mind too Firefox has only been out for a year and Internet Explorer is up to version 6. Five vulnerabilities are significant especially when a product is touted as "Secure".

I guess you would like that, to call IE secure, but even you can see how silly that would make you look. What you ignore to mention, is that each and every vulnerability has been promptly fixed. As for the version numbers, one would think that a product up to version '6', would have a lot of the bugs already ironed out of it. Apparently, not so. There are a lot more serious vulnerabilities found (and found more often) then Firefox, or Opera, or Safari, for that matter. Microsoft sometimes takes months to fix such a vulnerability and often the fix doesn't 100% fix the problem either!

STATEMENT 4"Firefox does not include a digital signature verifier like VeriSign for the web browser or it's plug-ins by default. This means that when you download Firefox or it's associated plug-ins you cannot be sure they are legitimate. Why is this a problem? Say you are recommended to download Firefox by a not so honest person who directs you to a link on their site but has recompiled the browser bundling it with Spyware. How would you know it is not the legitimate installation of Firefox? You wouldn't because there is no digital signature to verify it. Again for a program so hyped about Security they failed to include one of the most critical aspects that verify the program is what it claims to be, before you install it! Irony?"

You download the brower and plug-ins from the official website(s), of course, like you would do with all software products. Internet Explorer misses a lot of the features Firefox has built in. These features can often only be acquired by installing 3d-party products. Since these are installed with admin privileges (you run as admin all the time), how can you trust THESE programs not to install spyware, or erase your hard disk? Irony indeed.

"Innovations:Firefox is being touted as having innovated features as if it invented them, such as tabbed browsing and Pop-up blocking. I'm sorry to be the historian and ruin everyone's party but Opera has had these "Innovations" for years. So have other web browser like Avant Browser, Maxthon (MyIE2) and these programs all implement the system better."

Avant and Maxthon are only shells around the real IE browser. They have more features, but still suffer from the flaws inherent to Internet Explorer. And indeed, Opera is a better browser than IE as well. And it doesn't run ActiveX, for good reason.

The rest of your article is just a rant about the enthousiasm of Firefox users.Now that may irritate you, but what you forget is: they finally have something to be enthousiastic about.And for good reason.

"What you lack, is historical perspective. There are perfectly good reasons for those slogans like 'Take back the web!' etc. A more accurate description would be: 'Restore the balance', but these things tend to get overhyped, partly to get the message across."

-Since when has their been only one Web Browser available? Never. The choice has always been there.

"I know this last article talks specifically about Linux, but there are a lot of valid points in here about Windows security."

-Irrelevant the article was not about Windows Security. It even openly admits IE is not 100% secure only that neither it the beloved Firefox. This is not the place to discuss Windows vs. Linux Security it is specifically about IE vs. Firefox.

"There is a GOOD REASON Firefox does not use ActiveX. ActiveX is a bad idea in most cases. If webpages depend on ActiveX or were only tested in Internet Explorer, then the website developer(s) did a pretty bad job at it anyway. Not only do they deny themselves the benefits that come with the use of Open Standards (www.w3c.org), but they also loose X% of their target audience. Can you really afford to loose over 10% of your potential audience?"

-This is an absurd statement currently IE can render 99.99% of web sites correctly. Firefox only 75%. Who is loosing an audience? Ridiculous!

"What you ignore to mention, is that each and every vulnerability has been promptly fixed."

-In Firefox? I don't think so their are still 5 outstanding vulnerabilities. The more it is used the more that will be exposed. The link is clear and supports the security remarks against Firefox. Saying IE has had more vulnerabilities does not change this.

"You download the brower and plug-ins from the official website(s), of course, like you would do with all software products. Internet Explorer misses a lot of the features Firefox has built in. These features can often only be acquired by installing 3d-party products. Since these are installed with admin privileges (you run as admin all the time), how can you trust THESE programs not to install spyware, or erase your hard disk? Irony indeed."

-Ah Linux user, figures. Uh? Firefox is a third party application. The only key feature that really makes a difference when using the internet is a pop-up blocker that is installed through SP2 and is digitally signed. How does this change the FACT the Firefox installation is not digitally signed? It doesn't.

"Avant and Maxthon are only shells around the real IE browser. They have more features, but still suffer from the flaws inherent to Internet Explorer. And indeed, Opera is a better browser than IE as well. And it doesn't run ActiveX, for good reason."

-And they have all had the implied Firefox "Innovations" for a long time, far longer then Firefox. Again your missing the point.

"The rest of your article is just a rant about the enthousiasm of Firefox users. Now that may irritate you, but what you forget is: they finally have something to be enthousiastic about. And for good reason."

I used Firefox and IE. Big freakin deal?!?!?! Who cares. It is the Internet for crying out loud. IF I need to "surf the Internet better" I need to get a freakin life!!!

I am so tired of "open source" touters, or as I like to call them "open sores".

Look, Microsoft makesa product. It made it so that others can contribute software to it, make it easier and better to use. Look at the history of it you'll find so many contradictions by these "open sores" people:

First it was Windows is slow. So they make is faster. Then its Windows is a monopoly- funny but then the guy from Sun Microsystems says use my product instead- translation- make me the god you worship instead.

The ones that crakc me up are these - Windows is insecure. Yet, in a perfect mirror image of the "open sores" world so many people and companies devote hours and hours of finding AND REPORTING flaws to Microsoft so they can fix them. But everyone complains that this is bad. Wait- how in the world does Linux find out there are flaws? The same way.

How about "we want to play music on our system." ok, Microsoft developes a great media player- nto the best but a damn good one for free, includes it in the OS and says here you go. Then the world says "we want to use different ones, we don't like yours. Why did you include it for free, now ours that we want the public to pay for is rendered useless..." When will it stop????

If Microsoft charges for a product the world hates them. If they include it for free then people complain that it is included for free?!?!?!

When will people wake up and realize that nothing is perfect- not even Linux - and accept the fact that Microsoft is striving, just like all the others, to continually improve their software.

The one that really gets me is this-

About 2 years ago Microsoft was announcing that after 7 or 8 years it was going to stop updating Windows 98- AFTER 7 OR 8 YEARS PEOPLE!!! And the Linux folks said, "see, they hate you, they will not update older products..." And that same week Red Hat Linux said they would no longer support any version older than (I am sorry, I think it was) version 8 Fedora? And that meant that the 7.1 - 7.3 version that had been out for 1 year were not going to be supported. Excuse me? 1 year of support and yo uare cutting me off? Come on people- wake up- Linux is not the save all answer to the world. They will support a product for 1 year and then lead the charge for the media about how poor Microsoft's support is by letting a product go after 7 or 8 years?

Poor suuport - tha also cracks me up. Try calling Linux any time during the day and ask for free support. Oh, wait- that's right you have to pay for support. And then it is not really a free product now is it? Oh, and just try calling them... do it, try. Tell them that little Billy down the block developed a killer new ap for your companies servers and his friend Tommy made a few patches for it, but they are in class right now so you need to use some of your paid for support to help solve the problem... just try it.

I cannot wait for people to just stop trying to bash Microsoft. I never hear anyone bashing the car companies for building crappy cars... you know- stoip buying them then, maybe pirate a few illegal cars. Or how about people making their own Coke or Pepsi products?

iPod- think about it- "we'll make this for the MAC only" Nope- you never heard them state that did you??? They started with MAC the nincluded PC. Good move, I think it made them some money.

The world's must exist together. But the Linux folks will not allow it... no matter what propaganda they may say, the will simply not allow the wolrd to live together. They want to be the next monopoly...

Is it necessary to be so critical? Different people have very different responses to similar or identical situations. While some may kneel on the ground and profess Firefox to have changed their lives others just use it happily everyday. And don't begrudge folks their right to let others know about a good piece of software.

Like some of the other folks commented, I think there are a few problems to take note of in your three point criticism of "The Dark Side".

While WinXP SP2 may have added a pop-up blocker there are many people who don't use WinXP or SP2. To my knowledge some corporations like IBM are recommending users NOT to use SP2 until further evaluation has been done on it. So there are a lot of people who could benefit from the Firefox pop-up blocking capabilities. It seems to work quite well for me.

As others have said an ActiveX warning system won't prevent the installation of malware if you go ahead and click "OK". I read that it is quite simple to create and ActiveX control that will perform malicious actions. Many people just click "Yes" or "OK" or "I Agree" when such buttons appear.

No, Firefox is not 100% secure. That would be a hard claim for anyone to make. I do think that the security advantage of FF is that the open-source community can resolve problems more quickly than is sometimes done by MS.

As for 15% of site not working with Firefox...That statistic is far lower for all the sites I visit. Also I think we should be able to view web pages equally well with IE, FF, Opera or Safari etc. The Internet should be platform independent.

The innovations like tabbed browsing my not have originated with FF but it certainly makes good use of them. I used Opera for a while before starting to use FF several months ago and never did like it in the same way I've come to like FF. Mainly little thing. For instance in Opera the option on the menu to close a tab was too near the option to close all the tabs. That caused some frustration sometimes when clicking hurriedly.

So really I don't think FF is strictly anti-Microsoft. I think it is a better piece of software. And can help limit some problems I've seen folks experience when using IE. I will here apologize for any obnoxious users who've aggravated you or for being pushy myself...please respond in kind. Sincerely, V.F.D.

It's nice to hear a well thought out attack against Mozilla that wasn't written by a M$ employee.I am a Firefox user and prefer it over IE, but I do appreciate the point. It's the same point I preach about the music scene: "People blindly follow hype." In this case though, I tend to agree with the hype.

Seriously how sad is it that a program needs a web page like this:After such an immature comment, are we expected to take your comments seriously? You're not dissecting Mozilla's browser because it's flawed, you're doing it because it's no longer the cool alternative.

"After such an immature comment, are we expected to take your comments seriously? You're not dissecting Mozilla's browser because it's flawed, you're doing it because it's no longer the cool alternative."

-It is flawed and the flaws are pointed out in the article, if you care to read it. I honestly don't care if an application is "cool" or not only whether if it works or not.

"While WinXP SP2 may have added a pop-up blocker there are many people who don't use WinXP or SP2. To my knowledge some corporations like IBM are recommending users NOT to use SP2 until further evaluation has been done on it. So there are a lot of people who could benefit from the Firefox pop-up blocking capabilities. It seems to work quite well for me."

-IBM also sold it's computer division to a Chinese company. I wouldn't consider IBM and authority on Microsoft products let alone Windows XP.

"As others have said an ActiveX warning system won't prevent the installation of malware if you go ahead and click "OK". I read that it is quite simple to create and ActiveX control that will perform malicious actions. Many people just click "Yes" or "OK" or "I Agree" when such buttons appear."

-You can only do so much for people. If someone goes to a web site that autolaunches a windows instructing someone to autoinstall an application that is secretly bundled with Spyware is this Microsoft's fault too?

"I do think that the security advantage of FF is that the open-source community can resolve problems more quickly than is sometimes done by MS."

-This is another Myth and not proven.

"As for 15% of site not working with Firefox...That statistic is far lower for all the sites I visit."

-Again the exact words used are "Completely Compatible"

"So really I don't think FF is strictly anti-Microsoft."

-I don't think it is "strictly" anti-Microsoft either but I do believe a large percentage of it's user base is, especially the site www.spreadfirfox.com.

"1) Yeah, Internet Explorer SP2 is pretty safe, but I'd rather make a 4.5mb download than 40+mb for the latest IE+Patches."

-LOL, if you use Windows XP you have to download SP2 anyway, unless you like not patching security holes that affect the whole OS not just IE. Firefox does nothing for those and once your patched IE is now more secure. So it is actually 4.5MB less to download.

"2) Firefox is extensible. There are alot more *free* and usefull plugins for firefox than IE, they make browsing great."

-Really? That is why IE works with all these sites out of the box without having to download and install a myriad of plug-ins? Not to mention the Firefox PDF plug-in is very buggy. Something as universal as PDF not working on Firefox properly is a BIG problem.

"3) It's open source, its free (no, IE is NOT free, you have to buy the OS to get it and it's upgrades)"

-This is a dumb argument for windows users. Really think about it.

"4) IE is outdated. Firefox sports support for standards that have been around for years, IE is over 5 years behind. You may not care, but serious web developers do."

-Ah so that is why Firefox works with 15% less web pages then IE! Clue #1 people don't care about anything other then the page rendering how the author intended.

"5) I could go on and on... but you seem to not care.. as you obviously are more religious about "anti-religion" than most of us "Firefox followers"."

-Keep up the Crusade! I'm sure at some point you will realize how absurd it is.

"IBM also sold it's computer division to a Chinese company. I wouldn't consider IBM and authority on Microsoft products let alone Windows XP."

- The first point is not addressed. There are people who don't use XP, let alone SP2. With Microsoft making IE updates unavailable to anyone not using the latest version of their OS, a secure third-party browser is the logical alternative. Also, regardless of your mudslinging and personal opinions of IBM or whatever party that does not advocate the use of SP2, it changes nothing. Some people will not have access to it, no matter how hard you try to deride the credibility of the involved parties. Again, a third-party browser is the logical alternative.

"You can only do so much for people. If someone goes to a web site that autolaunches a windows instructing someone to autoinstall an application that is secretly bundled with Spyware is this Microsoft's fault too?"

No. But it changes nothing. Regardless of whether it is Microsoft's fault, the ActiveX spyware install DID happen. Why should the argument that it is not Microsoft's fault be relevent to the end user, if they have the choice to use a browser that does NOT allow such installs in the first place? Would you forgive and continue to use a substandard product just because the defects weren't the manufacturer's fault, or would you switch to a superior product? The answer is obvious.

"This is another Myth and not proven."

- Quite the short-term memory you have here. Show me a critical security flaw in Firefox that has gone unpatched for more than 72 hours since its discovery by the developers. Microsoft, on the other hand, took almost 3 months to issue a patch for the XMLHTTP security bug. Microsoft has gained a well-deserved NOTORIOUS reputation for allowing CRITICAL SECURITY FLAWS to run amok for months before bothering to fix them. I could list other examples, but I'm sure you can discover them yourself, if you're willing to see past your own nose and realize how ridiculous that comment sounds.

"Again the exact words used are 'Completely Compatible'."

- Wow. It's such a vital issue that people are turning away from Firefox in droves. I think it's a testament to the irrevelence of the issue that Firefox has been the first browser to consistently drive down IE's market share since the end of the Browser Wars. Some people get ballistic over every single misplaced table or incorrect font size that differs from what they're used to seeing in IE by 2 pixels - well, guess what? Others don't. They're perfectly capable of seeing the benefits Firefox offers over IE because they're not obsessed over how Firefox misaligns the text by 2 millimetres.

"The first point is not addressed. There are people who don't use XP, let alone SP2. With Microsoft making IE updates unavailable to anyone not using the latest version of their OS, a secure third-party browser is the logical alternative. Also, regardless of your mudslinging and personal opinions of IBM or whatever party that does not advocate the use of SP2, it changes nothing. Some people will not have access to it, no matter how hard you try to deride the credibility of the involved parties. Again, a third-party browser is the logical alternative."

- Nope, for people who do not use IE they can do steps 1 through 3 here http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/OptimizeXP.html and get similar protection. Firefox is a solution for Firefox advocates only.

"No. But it changes nothing. Regardless of whether it is Microsoft's fault, the ActiveX spyware install DID happen. Why should the argument that it is not Microsoft's fault be relevent to the end user, if they have the choice to use a browser that does NOT allow such installs in the first place? Would you forgive and continue to use a substandard product just because the defects weren't the manufacturer's fault, or would you switch to a superior product? The answer is obvious."

-Hello! Spyware installs "happen" all the time from people clicking on ads! Installing P2P programs ect.. It is only a matter of time until these are directed at Firefox users. You think Spyware installed through an application can not redirect Firefox? LMAO! How nieve are you?

"- Quite the short-term memory you have here. Show me a critical security flaw in Firefox that has gone unpatched for more than 72 hours since its discovery by the developers. Microsoft, on the other hand, took almost 3 months to issue a patch for the XMLHTTP security bug. Microsoft has gained a well-deserved NOTORIOUS reputation for allowing CRITICAL SECURITY FLAWS to run amok for months before bothering to fix them. I could list other examples, but I'm sure you can discover them yourself, if you're willing to see past your own nose and realize how ridiculous that comment sounds."

- Check the link in the article, five outstanding vulnerabilities exist. I consider a vulnerability that allows an unknown third party acces to my checking account SERIOUS!

"Wow. It's such a vital issue that people are turning away from Firefox in droves. I think it's a testament to the irrevelence of the issue that Firefox has been the first browser to consistently drive down IE's market share since the end of the Browser Wars. Some people get ballistic over every single misplaced table or incorrect font size that differs from what they're used to seeing in IE by 2 pixels - well, guess what? Others don't. They're perfectly capable of seeing the benefits Firefox offers over IE because they're not obsessed over how Firefox misaligns the text by 2 millimetres."

-Now that they know you WILL see some switch. Some have been switching and constantly go back and forth between browsers until they find it annoying and just use IE. I am sure the Firefox Propaganda machine will attempt to keep these things quite.

"Nope, for people who do not use IE they can do steps 1 through 3 here http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/OptimizeXP.html and get similar protection. Firefox is a solution for Firefox advocates only."

Incorrect. People become Firefox advocates by downloading and installing Firefox - IE users don't become Firefox zealots just like that. Your solution is still less inherently secure than using a 3rd party browser, because IE is so integrated into Windows you couldn't pry them apart with a crowbar. It's the problem of the browsers' underlying architecture - anything that can exploit IE has a good chance of doing the same to Windows. No matter how hard you try to lock the door, the door is still there, and presenting itself as a target to billions of black hat crackers. 3rd party browsers do not have that door, and there are much less people trying to pry at the windows, no less. Not to mention that your solution advocates Windows Update and XP. Have you ever tried updating Windows from a fresh installation on a dial-up connection? Have you realized how many people do not have access to XP? I thought as much.

"Hello! Spyware installs "happen" all the time from people clicking on ads! Installing P2P programs ect.. It is only a matter of time until these are directed at Firefox users. You think Spyware installed through an application can not redirect Firefox? LMAO! How nieve are you?"

How stupid are you? Do you actually believe you have any idea of what you're talking about, much less a grasp on reality? Firefox does not allow ActiveX or drive-by installs - I'd LOVE to see you prove that Firefox users get automated spyware installs from within the browser. There are no repeated prompts of 'CLICK HERE!!1!!1!' or 'You must install our software to enter' that beleaguer so many users to clicking OK just to get rid of the alerts. Or are you really grasping at straws so much that you have to resort to arguments that Firefox users can become spyware-infected when they MANUALLY download and run it THEMSELVES as opposed to doing so out of sheer frustration after continual harrassment by their browser, and then have their browser automatically launch it for them?

"Check the link in the article, five outstanding vulnerabilities exist. I consider a vulnerability that allows an unknown third party acces to my checking account SERIOUS!"

You've got a point there. I hope they fix those soon, too. That aside - how does it make Firefox any less secure than IE? How does that even make Firefox just as secure as IE is, as opposed to being lightyears ahead? Please do explain.

"Now that they know you WILL see some switch. Some have been switching and constantly go back and forth between browsers until they find it annoying and just use IE. I am sure the Firefox Propaganda machine will attempt to keep these things quite."

To quote you - "This is another Myth and not proven." Perhaps you find it necessary to resort to terms such as 'Firefox Propaganda Machine' just to defend your argument - could it be perhaps you're trying to draw attention from the fact that there isn't any solid proof to back yourself up with? The only reason that IE is dominant, being such a craptacular pile of programming shit that it is, is that it comes pre-installed. Once people find out they have a choice - hey, who knows?

"Incorrect. People become Firefox advocates by downloading and installing Firefox - IE users don't become Firefox zealots just like that."

- Nope incorrect, people become Firefox advocates by being misled into thinking that IE can not be secure from Spyware infection.

"Your solution is still less inherently secure than using a 3rd party browser, because IE is so integrated into Windows you couldn't pry them apart with a crowbar. It's the problem of the browsers' underlying architecture - anything that can exploit IE has a good chance of doing the same to Windows. No matter how hard you try to lock the door, the door is still there, and presenting itself as a target to billions of black hat crackers. 3rd party browsers do not have that door, and there are much less people trying to pry at the windows, no less. Not to mention that your solution advocates Windows Update and XP. Have you ever tried updating Windows from a fresh installation on a dial-up connection? Have you realized how many people do not have access to XP? I thought as much.'"

- First off I am sure I have updated 100x more PCs then you have considering my occupation as an OEM. The solution I provide is sound and has been proven so. Everyone that uses it sees no more auto-installation occurences of Spyware. My solution advocates patching your system PERIOD. Complaining about Dial-up is NOT an excuse. Microsoft will send you SP2 on a CD for FREE. http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/updates/sp2/cdorder/en_us/default.mspx

"How stupid are you? Do you actually believe you have any idea of what you're talking about, much less a grasp on reality? Firefox does not allow ActiveX or drive-by installs - I'd LOVE to see you prove that Firefox users get automated spyware installs from within the browser. There are no repeated prompts of 'CLICK HERE!!1!!1!' or 'You must install our software to enter' that beleaguer so many users to clicking OK just to get rid of the alerts. Or are you really grasping at straws so much that you have to resort to arguments that Firefox users can become spyware-infected when they MANUALLY download and run it THEMSELVES as opposed to doing so out of sheer frustration after continual harrassment by their browser, and then have their browser automatically launch it for them?"

- How stupid are you to not READ or COMPREHEND what I posted? Where did I say Firefox is subject to Auto Spyware installation? Nowhere, I said it can be compromised during the installation of ANY third party application. You obviously don't read what others write so I will repeat IE can be made secure from Auto installing Spyware EASILY.

"You've got a point there. I hope they fix those soon, too. That aside - how does it make Firefox any less secure than IE? How does that even make Firefox just as secure as IE is, as opposed to being lightyears ahead? Please do explain."

- Do YOU READ ANYTHING? I've said this OVER and OVER. You obvious are so insistent about defending your beloved Firefox you forget to READ! The article relating to security was to prove that Firefox is NOT 100% SECURE!!! NOT MORE SECURE THEN IE.

"To quote you - "This is another Myth and not proven." Perhaps you find it necessary to resort to terms such as 'Firefox Propaganda Machine' just to defend your argument - could it be perhaps you're trying to draw attention from the fact that there isn't any solid proof to back yourself up with? The only reason that IE is dominant, being such a craptacular pile of programming shit that it is, is that it comes pre-installed. Once people find out they have a choice - hey, who knows?"

- There HAS ALWAYS been a choice. The "craptacular pile of programming shit" just happens to render 99.99% of all web sites correctly and completely. FYI the majority of Mac users use IE too. Your obvious intent on ignoring THESE FACTS. Fine live in your own reality.

"First off I am sure I have updated 100x more PCs then you have considering my occupation as an OEM."

Try me, I am the OWNER of a computer business and I constantly upgrade computers, building computers, and recommend firefox. I dont preach it. (Do you even know what preaching is?) Firefox is overall more user friendly, even if you do have to install some plug-ins at first. There are not myriads of them. a single myriad is a "very large number" often thought to be 10,000 times 10,000. There are not that many plug-ins for any program! Besides when you first install firefox, you probably want to install a theme anyway, so a mere 3-5 more small downloads isn't that much. At least you can customize firefox. You are not stuck with one look. Some websites say you can download a different look to IE, but often they are bundled with spyware and all it does is change a background, not the real look (buttons, scroll bars, etc.). Look Andrew, if you want to stick with IE, go ahead. I am sorry you are too close-minded to try it out and see why so many people enjoy surfing the net again! To all Firefox users... *sighs* somepeople will never learn.

All my clients and customers enjoy surfing the internet too, with IE! And without being infected with Spyware. The word Myriad was used to mean a great number. Don't get me wrong a lot of people are misled into thinking IE can not be secure from auto installing Spyware. I am meerly proving this is not true.

How user friendly Firefox is a matter of opinion. IE is far from not being user friendly. BTW who is talking about themes?

As someone pointed out, the web should be platform independent. Why does MS feel the need to limit certain portions of the web to Windows users only?

To the person who calls open source advocates "open sores", why? Why do you dislike the idea of high quality FREE software? I got tired of paying for everything in Windows: IE plugins, audio/video codecs, email clients, anything without adware, programming IDEs, plugins for those IDEs, decent CD burning software, anything and everything. Hell, I can't even export my Outlook contacts in vCard format without paying $50 for some stupid commercial plugin.

To the ignorant comment about Fedora Core not supporting older versions. First off, Fedora Core is only on version 3 right now and version 1 is no longer "supported" (updated actually). Second off, you are ignorant because you don't understand what the Fedora Core project is. It is (beta) testing grounds for what software/technology gets put into Red Hat releases. Fedora Core IS NOT MEANT for a production environment. It is TESTING SOFTWARE. Why can't people understand that? Once you "get it" you will understand why Fedora Core releases come out every 4 months and why they stop updating older releases so quickly.

As someone already mentioned, not everyone uses IE or has the capacity to (Mac or Unix users). Thus webpage authors are missing out on those users if their web pages only work on IE and Windows. Why not make the webpage conform to open standards and thus open up your page to 100% of the clients out there?

IE does not conform to standards. The only reason that it can be considered to show pages 'correctly' is because there was a time when IE was used by 95%+ of web surfers. That's why web designers began to ignore standards and simply make pages work for IE. That's why some pages appear broken in Firefox. For example, the [bgsound] (won't let me use < >) tag isn't part of the HTML standard, but IE renders it. But since it isn't in the HTML spec, Firefox ignores it.

The standard being IE. People don't really care about standards though only if a page renders how the author intended it. The whole standard compliance with IE is just nonsense. If you write a standard compliant page IE renders it correctly too. The end user really does not care why a page does not work or look correctly only if it does. This is why IE will remain on top and what Firefox users do not get.

Its simple to me honestly, if I make an application, I choose if I am going to make it work on Mac, Linux, or Windows, or all three - though 90 percent of the world chooses windows only.

I see no difference in a webpage, there is no "rule" that a webpage I make has to work on all platforms. More and more people are getting to the point where they are saying screw this, and make it work for 9 out of 10 users and not care if it works for the other. Yes you loose potential clients, but you can focus on serving the other 90 percent better, instead of spending all your time making some of the more advanced parts of a site work in all browsers, for a tiny minority.

Oh, a random number in a Business Week article. Is that all you got? Please. Don't bother showing up again if that's all you're going to bring.

Show me some PROOF 15% of all the websites on the Interweb "aren't compatible" with Firefox, and I'll happily concede the point to you. Don't show me an article with some random columnist throwing around random numbers with no data to back them up.

"Analysts say". Who? Which analysts? Are they Business Week's anaylsts? PC World's? The guys down at Joe's Pool Hall? SpongeBob SquarePants' crack team of Browser Stat Ninjas? Where's their data? Is it online and available to look at? Does it even exist?

That's simply irresponsible journalism. In their case, however, it's more acceptable, since it's not meant to criticize or highlight a "problem". You're more irresponsible than them, because you didn't bother with any fact-checking before reprinting it, and passing it off as an unmitigated fact in an effort to degrade and defile an organization's product. Not to mention, you're repeating it as fact without giving credit, by the way...tsk tsk tsk. Irresponsible.

Hmm, let me see if I can play this same numbers game:

My own personal team of analysts say the number is closer to 3.7%.

WOW! 3.7%? Amazing. Looks like you've been proven wrong. I'll expect a retraction within a day.

Making up numbers is fun! I'll now go print them in an online article somewhere and some Mozilla zealot can pass them off as fact, just like you've done here. However, somehow I think that would make you pretty angry. =)

Look, I don't care what you use, I don't care what the true number is, and I don't care that you've got a grapefruit-sized bug up your ass for Mozilla and Open Source programs. I just hate when windbags with a blog and an audience spread pointless, baseless FUD.

No retraction will be forthcoming so don't hold your breath. The number is accurate, especially considering I work for a fairly large OEM and it matches up with the numbers we get regarding service calls and Firefox.

Keep in mind the article CLEARLY states: 15% of web pages aren't COMPLETELY compatible with Firefox. Which can be the result of numerous rendering issues as well. The number has been backed up with a source I suggest you take the issue up further with business week.

if IE is clearly the standard, then why would anyone attack firefoxs 5 vunerabilities? Then surely firefox is actually more secure. Everyone attacks Windows because its the standard, not Linux, which has just as much vunerability.

well your whole article, and alot of your posts on the blog seem to be religiously against firefox, and for IE in most cases. however everyone is entitled to their own choice.

your arguement also starts out at as simply about the fanatics who love firefox too much, and the websites. with this i agree whole heartdly, anyone who takes a web browser that seriously needs to re evaluate their life.

however there is nothing wrong with firefox as a browser, it has vunerabilites, and as i mentioned in the adblock article comments it is by no means infalable. but in this sense isnt everything vunerable? there is no such as thing as 'secure'. do you think the system your on now is entirely secure?

there will always be someone willing to exploit every vunerability in anything. so rather than pretend these vunerabilities exist, they go public, some people suffer, some people dont, they get patched, a new one appears and it starts over. it will never change.

there are also plenty of benefits with using a customizable browser. firefox, opera, maxathon (formerly avant) and many others offer the ability to change themes and add further functionality. and whilst firefox is certainly not the newest around, it does a pretty good job on this front, with help from the 'fanatics' and the community as a whole. which is where IE stumbles short in my opinion.

for example:with my firefox setup i can block all obtrusive adds and popups. capture all popups into tabs to stop my task bar overflowing (the main reason i abandoned IE), one click login to my email and much much more.

yes IE+SP2 has a better popup blocker than Firefox, your 100% correct. Firefoxs popup blocker is nothing more than an attempt to keep up with IE and integrating it into the browser. Hence why it looks identical when a popup is blocked.

Whilst Firefox falls short there though IE stumbles short on the customization front. Whilst Firefox suffers from rubbish popup blocker syndrome, it has an excellent array of community made extensions (Adblock, Tab Browser Preferences, Gmail Notifier, Webmail Compose, Flashgot, WeatherFox) and many more.

People who believe that Firefox will make their systems secure are idiots, and deserve what they get. But with Microsoft bundling a browser with the most popular operating system in the world, firefox have some competition to get their product across. So proclaiming it has some more worth while features when compared to IE is not wrong. After all, this is how all business works. If you dont provide a better product and support for that product you wont succeed, which is why firefox is succeeding in becoming more popular.

Firefox is gaining most of its popularity from the claims that it is secure, does not get spyware and has features that are taunted as new. These "Features" are not new and many other browsers have had them for years, they also do a better job with them then Firefox.

"Firefox is gaining most of its popularity from the claims that it is secure, does not get spyware and has features that are taunted as new. "->Then show me where it says that on the official site.

"These "Features" are not new and many other browsers have had them for years, they also do a better job with them then Firefox."->Thats purely your opinion, also none of the features are claimed to be new to firefox.

When you hit Ctrl + N in Firefox it does not open a new tab but a whole new window. You can not organize tabs by dragging them around. You can do both in AvantBrowser and other browsers. Firefox's tab feature is not as good

Andrew, please use Ctrl-T to open a new tab in FFX. Use the Tabbrowser extensions extension that adds so much to the core tab functionality of Mozilla based browsers (ofcourse FFX). This has so much tabs related functionality that is difficult to find in any other existing tabbed browser or browser-wrapper.

The spreadfirefox.com is crazy. Most Firefox users don't like advertisemetns, and a number of Firefox users even remove every single ads from every single website they visit. (very unethical) And the spreadfirefox is distributing affiliated links. How ridiculous.

I have never gotten spyware or viruses or anything using IE.. and IE 7 freaking rocks. You FF Fanboys need to grow up. Most of you are the same fanboys for the Xbox.. aka.. Microsoft. fucking hypocrites.

Personally, I see both IE and Firefox as useless. I have tried six different browsers (IE, Firefox, Opera, AOL Explorer, Avant, and Maxthon), and I have to say, Opera pwns them all. If you like ANY of the features of IE, get Maxthon, it does everything it (and Avant) does (and many things Firefox does). If you ask me, IE 7 is like a half-assed Avant, it has less features, and the ones that are included are possibly the worst I've ever seen. Maybe AOL has a worse tab system (I never used it very long, NEVER as a primary browser. I got it with AIM, which is a program I hate, and now I just use Trillian for whatever I would need AIM for). There is one way Firefox is better, however: it is open-source. This doesn't matter to me, as I don't know C(or whatever language it is written in, even though I want to learn someday). To an experienced programmer, this would be great (if he/she actually had the time). However, the fact that it is open-source makes it less secure, but it is still more secure than IE. I am not at all an Xbox fanboy, I think it is useless when you have a PC. The single best game on the Xbox 360 is Oblivion, and the PC version is better. I am very excited for the Wii, but PC will probably still stay on top. The ONLY two browsers that are really useful are Opera and Maxthon (even though I prefer Firefox to Maxthon since it's faster). I don't like Macs either, they seem to be a gayer version of a PC.

Please don't feed the fanboys. They seem to thrive on conflict so the simple answer would be to let them gather in circles and read from the non-existant book of mozilla while preaching the superiority of a middling attempt at a browser and rabidly attacking anyone who dares to say Firefox might not be the computer gods special gift to mankind. I've used Firefox for a long time, but I was never this idiotic, you people make me ashamed to admit it's installed on my system.

Say what you will, I can only go by what my own experience (on both Mac and PC) tells me, which is:

1) On my Mac, I use Firefox almost exclusively. Not because of adblocker, but because of the huge amount of functionality the add-ons provide that I cannot find anywhere else. On the fun side, themes also make it more visually flexible and appealing. For my use, I'm able to do much more than I can with Safari, IE or Netscape.

2) On my PC, I also have gone to Firefox, because I really have little choice. Regardless of anything I do, on IE, popups make browsing miserably impossible. Even with the highest filter settings, soft porn popups still occur on IE, and spyware is a huge problem. Netscape just doesn't seem to work well either. But Firefox actually functions, and provides the advantages that I've come to depend on in cataloging sites for research, etc.

Am I a Mac fan? You bet. I've worked on both, and there is no comparison, for what I do.

Is Firefox my religion. Of course not. That's ridiculous. Am I a fan? You bet. Open source means that it is updated and improved constantly. Problems are fixed, while IE and Netscape feel antiquated in comparison. Safari, too, for that matter. For me, it simply works much, much better and faster. "Tricked out" with the appropriate add-ons, Firefox provides great functionality and even if you removed the adblocking feature, I would still love it.

Yes, once in a great while, I find a site that isn't compatible, but that is very rare. 1 in 4? no. 1 in 400? no. More like 1 in 4000...in my experience. I can live with that.

Mac users have options besides Safari and Firefox such as Opera which includes many features found in Firefox Add-ons already built-in.

On the PC you have plenty of choice! Freeware Browsers - All of the Browsers "function". What a ridiculous comment. If you continue to get pop-ups that can be due to many reasons. Most likely you never installed any updates for IE or do not have Windows XP or Vista. Windows XP SP2 included a Pop-up blocker equivalent or better than the one in Firefox. IE7 also includes one. Otherwise you may be infected with Spyware, which needs to be removed. Spyware is a non-issue with anyone who follows simple security measures like those found in this guide:

Open Source means it is - Open Source, nothing more. You are not guaranteed anything from it being "Open Source". Please do not be naive. "Updated Frequently" is a Myth spread by fanboys. Just look to the thousands of "Dead" projects on Sourceforge.

Firefox is not faster than IE, Opera, Netscape or Safari. That is another Myth.

I feel sorry for you, Andrew. It seems that as soon as you post this all of the... "Dedicated" FF users came directly here with one thought in mind: Defend Firefox at all costs.

Seriously, I keep seeing the same points raised by Firefox users here that you've already refuted several times. They must be blind with rage to just completely ignore what you are saying or to misinterpret your words as much as they are.

This only proves your point that there are Firefox users that are on a crusade right now. They'll instantly bash away at any source that claims that Firefox isn't the God that some people make it out to be. I must say, the way that some people defend Firefox is shockingly similar to the way that people defend a religion.

And I can already see the Firefox users that are about ready to charge me, so let me just say this: I use both browsers. But I honestly don't see what makes Firefox so great, and what gives people this "OMG THIS IS THE BEST THING SINCE JESUS" attitude that they have. I really don't see much of a difference between the two. Though I use both, I'm more likely to use IE because, among other things, I like the tabbing better and I don't feel like searching for the plugin to change FF's tabbing.

Just know, Andrew, that at least one person (oops, almost forgot about the other guy that posted towards the top) agrees with your editorial. :P

Opera is supperior to FF anyways. I can't stand the FF fanboyism or the cult has seemed for form around it anymore than you. It's just when the mass majority of internet users started making the switch from IE to something else Opera still cost 40 bucks and FF was free. Now thats all changed and Opera is offered totally free, no ads, and offers a much better browsing experience. It's much faster, I don't need to install any ridiculous plugins in order to get basic functionality that should be default in a browser by now and it has one of the nicest download managers I've ever seen. Opera is for the power user, FF is for the scared novice that can't deal with learning a new interface.

I'd like to add this one to the long list of myths in firefox.(Myth) Firefox downloads better than IE.-reality: Firefox downloads just as bad as IE, complete with corrupted, truncated files and incomplete youtube videos. Couldn't even finish downloading Happy Tree friends while IE seamlessly finished a 7 minute vid about laughing babies.

Plus Plugins in firefox is like the ActiveX in IE. It makes your computer vunerable once installed. It can hijack your www.youtube.com to a completely generic search engine but won't work in IE. Remember, when firefox gets screwed up, I'd suggest uninstalling your FFX and install Opera.I hope we could make spreadfirefox.com as a public nuisance. Strike the FFX Fanboys through the heart and they will die... eventually.

I'm an IT Engineer of 15+years, training, and in the field: Hardware and O/S installation/Configuration. I have been using Windows and the internet since the late 1990s. I test, report and advise on various programs, utilities and hardware for my company, friends, family and clients.

Before IE7, IE was fairly shoddy, and beset by many problems with viruses, "drive-by" malicious installs, etc.

Netscape Navigator hasn't been a serious contender since before the Millennium.

Opera is a fine browser, but suffers, IMO, from usability problems.

Ditto Safari and Chrome, (though Chrome is only in Beta test at the moment, I have good expectations from it).

Firefox is good, but there are countless extra downloads (extensions/add-ons) to make it anywhere near as usable as other browsers.

In all that time, with Windows being constantly updated and patched as soon as updates/patches are available, I have had less than 5 virus/spyware/malware infections in two years of using IE7 as my main browser.

In more or less the same span of time, using Firefox (also updated as and when available), I have had well over 45 infections, including 2 last month that somehow got past my active/real-time scanner and infected me with a .zlob trojan that's well over 4 years old.

I get similar results from clients that use my services for maintaining their systems.

As such, I can, in all conscience, only recommend, when asked, that IE7, fully patched and updated, be the browser of choice for secure browsing. If they want to use another browser, by all means, but I warn them to ensure they have at least two good, up-to-date, anti-viral and Anti-trojan/Adware scanners, and to use a "keyscrambler" utility no matter what browser they use. I also recommend that they not trust Windows built-in firewall. Not to mention : Never blindly click "OK" when the firewall or O/S security system asks them if a program is to run, install, or get access to the internet.

Still, at the end of the day, it's a user's choice what browser(s) to use; what websites they browse; and what programs to download/install. It keeps me in a job tidying up the mess afterwards. :P

One just wishes more people used the brains they were born with to actually test various programs instead of just blindly following the loudest "opinion".

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